1. The Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to music education and, in particular, to a system for scheduling students, teachers, practice rooms, musical instruments, and an accompaniment library.
2. The Prior Art
In the field of music education there has been a long-standing problem of qualitative and quantitative matching of students, instructors and outside professional musicians in addition to coordinating rehearsal and lesson time and location which involve one or more of the above individuals. This problem is somewhat compounded by the fact that the students must, in addition to having lessons, practice and thus require both the musical selection and a room, but not necessarily an instructor. There are times that a soloist performer, either vocalist or instrumentalist, requires someone to accompany them during the practice session.
The recent vast increase in electronic gadgetry has included a substantial number of electronic musical instruments and synthesizers of the xe2x80x9ckaraokexe2x80x9d type which allow a performer, a vocalist in this example, to select appropriate accompaniments, an orchestral arrangement in this example, for their practice, performance and enjoyment. This has been relatively simple for vocalists since music can easily be recorded without a vocalist or prerecorded music can be filtered to eliminate the previous vocal. It is far more difficult for instrumentalist, particularly those involved with classical music, to find an appropriate accompaniment. Instrumentalist and vocalists only have access to xe2x80x9crun-throughsxe2x80x9d of these pieces which do not include wood block cues to train rhythmic aspects and coordinate ensemble. Furthermore, it is virtually impossible to find selections which offer only the solo musical line so that the accompanist can practice his or her part. One reason is the lack of a musical library from which to draw musical selections and another is the difficulty in electronically remastering a classical recording to eliminate and/or feature a single instrument without unduly deteriorating the quality of the entire musical selection.
The present invention is a music education system which allows scheduling of students, teachers, rooms, accompanists, and employees or consultants.
The scheduler portion of the invention has a database which includes all pertinent information on rooms (size, location, permanent equipment, etc.), teachers (availability, specialties, etc.), students (level of accomplishment, other academic schedules, etc.), accompanists (instruments, availability, skill levels, etc.), and administration (academic calender, access, etc.). This allows for matching of students, teachers, rooms, etc. and printing of schedules for all persons involved in a music program.
Another aspect of the present invention lies in a specific and unique method for recording music designed to assist in practicing and preparatory score study by individual musicians with or without accompaniment. The method has the steps of setting a metronome speed at about 0.5 to 0.75 performance tempo, and then sequencing a musical selection in the following order: first wood block cue preparatory upbeats on a first channel; piano part on a second channel; solo part on a third channel transposed by octave out of the range of piano accompaniment; solo part on a fourth channel at printed pitch using appropriately-sequenced voice; second wood block cue main beats throughout piece on a fifth channel; third wood block cues necessary for soloist on a sixth channel; fourth wood block cues necessary for pianist on a seventh channel; any additional offbeat or special wood block cues on eighth or subsequent channels; and any sectional or skeletal tracks on remaining channels.